KTM Ajo’s Jose Antonio Rueda earned a commanding victory over the Moto3 field to win the first race of the season at the Chang International Circuit.

The Spanish rider won the race by over seven seconds from teammate Alvaro Carpe to continue his momentum from pre-season. 

It was Rueda who got the strongest start and was able to take the lead going into Turn 1.

Polesitter Matteo Bertelle was able to recover from being overtaken on the start and pulled a move on Rueda in Turn 3, but the Spanish rider regained the lead later in the first lap. 

The final corner saw the first collision of the race as rookie Cormac Buchanan crashed in the final corner and took out Eddie O’Shea.

The pack continued to grow with the leading group consisting of 15 riders in the first three laps as David Munoz made his way through to second.

A gap started to open between the top six riders and the rest of the field as Adrian Fernandez and the returning Dennis Foggia jostled for seventh. 

Bertelle made his way back through on Munoz for second as he looked to follow Rueda at the head of the field. 

Leader Rueda ran wide which allowed the group behind to close in as Luca Lunetta made contact with Munoz. 

The Spanish rider then rode into the side of Lunetta, which pushed the Italian off track and ended any chances of him getting onto the podium.

Yamanaka crashed out from third soon after, which promoted Adrian Fernandez into the podium positions. 

Despite being under investigation for his incident with Lunetta, Munoz continued with his momentum and challenged Rueda for the lead, but the KTM rider returned to the front of the pack. 

Munoz was then awarded a long lap penalty as he and Rueda continued to fight for the lead, but the IntactGP rider then crashed out of second to end his chances of race victory.

Piqueras made a mistake which saw him crash into the back of Kelso as the Australian exited the race, while Foggia had to take avoiding action and was pushed down into seventh. 

Rueda went largely unchallenged for the rest of the race and took the chequered flag to win the race by a margin of 7.276s. 

The final lap saw the battle for the podium heat up, with Stefano Nepa running wide as he seeked his first top-three finish, allowing Fernandez and Carpe running through.

It was Carpe who stole second place to ensure a 1-2 for the KTM Ajo team, as Fernandez completed the podium. 

Nepa took fourth place, while polesitter Bertelle ended the race in fifth position.

Foggia finished sixth on his return to Moto3, while David Almansa made contact with Scott Ogden in the last corner to take seventh, as the Brit crashed out of the race. 

Riccardo Rossi was eighth ahead of Joel Esteban in ninth, as Lunetta recovered from his incidents with Munoz to finish inside the top ten. 

South African Ruche Moodley was 11th on his Moto3 debut, seven seconds ahead of the rejoining Piqueras in 12th. 

Marcos Uriarte earned a 13th position on his debut with the MLav Racing team, with replacement rider Adrian Cruces taking 14th. 

Buchanan recovered from his early incident and took the final points position in 15th.

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KTM Ajo’s Celestino Vietti took a commanding Malaysian Moto2 victory on his return from injury to clinch his third win of the campaign. 

Vietti led every lap of the race on his return from a broken collarbone after getting the jump off the line ahead of stand-in rider Jorge Navarro

The Italian took the lead of the race ahead of Ogura and the American Racing pair of Marcos Ramirez and Navarro into the first corner.

A crash in the early stages took Alberto Surra, who was replacing Fermin Aldeguer at Speed Up, out of the race alongside Senna Agius and Zonta van den Goorbergh.

Ramirez was able to overtake Ogura going into the penultimate corner of the first lap, restoring himself into second place. 

Race leader Vietti managed to pull a gap on the group behind, putting a second between himself and Ramirez on the first lap. 

The battle in the early stages was for the top five as Deniz Oncu was overtaken by Navarro after making a double save, while Jake Dixon forced his way through on Albert Arenas for seventh. 

Ramirez was able to close the gap on race leader Vietti and was briefly able to overtake the Italian after a mistake into Turn 1. 

The KTM Ajo rider was able to regain his lead, but the race became a battle between a group of five riders. 

Navarro looked to recover from his shaky start and overtook Izan Guevara for fourth, before then passing Ogura to reinstate himself amongst the podium positions. 

The polesitter continued on his road to recovery as he overtook teammate Ramirez for second as he hoped to hunt down Vietti for the lead. 

Positions continued to change in the top five, as Ogura passed Ramirez for third and Dixon was able to overtake teammate Guevara for fifth. 

As Navarro was chasing down Vietti for the lead, a technical issue for Ogura saw the world champion out of the race. 

Dixon momentarily dropped behind Ramirez after Ogura’s incident in front of him, but the Briton was able to regain the final podium spot with six laps to go. 

The podium positions remained locked with three laps remaining, but Guevara was still able to make progress as he overtook Ramirez for fourth. 

Tony Arbolino made quiet progress through the pack and was also able to overtake Ramirez to move into the top five. 

Dixon looked to have secured a podium place going onto the final lap of the race but believed that the race had finished, meaning the British rider rolled off and lost his podium place to teammate Guevara. 

It was KTM Ajo’s Vietti who crossed the line to take his third win of 2024 after leading every lap of the race. 

Valencian rider Navarro sealed an emotional second place as a stand-in rider for the American Racing team. 

Former Moto3 champion Guevara took his first podium in the Moto2 class after overtaking teammate Dixon on the final lap of the race. 

Arbolino crossed the line fifth behind the Aspar pairing, while Ramirez eventually finished sixth.

Oncu took seventh after struggling with the tyres late on in the race ahead of Aron Canet in eighth, who sealed second place in the championship with his result.

Somkiat Chantra was ninth narrowly clear of Diogo Moreira who completed the top ten. 

Manuel Gonzalez led Gresini teammate Arenas over the line in 11th and 12th respectively. 

Alonso Lopez finished a lowly 13th for SpeedUp ahead of Sergio Garcia in 14th.

Filip Salac was promoted to the final points position in 15th on the final lap following Jeremy Alcoba’s crash out of the race.

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Jose Antonio Rueda fended off Collin Veijer en route to win at the Aragon Grand Prix, the 12th round in the 2024 Moto3 schedule.

In charging form, the Spaniard secured his first win of the season after starting in second position and conquered a thrilling race.

Pole-sitter David Alonso quickly established a comfortable lead as the lights went out, as Joel Kelso climbed up to second position after starting fifth.

It was a different story for David Munoz, who fell down the order to P13 after starting in third for the Red Bull KTM Ajo team.

Unfortunately for Kelso, the rider’s charge to second-place was short-lived as he resided back in sixth.

In fact, the top-five places were hotly contested during the race’s opening laps, besides Alonso’s gap over the charging field behind him.

This was until with seven laps to go, Alonso was chased down by Veijer who was setting quicker lap times than the CFMOTO Aspar rider.

On the next lap, Veijer made his move and took the lead from Alonso, who was shortly overtaken by Red Bull KTM Ajo’s Rueda.

It seemed that Alonso could not keep up his form in the closing stages despite his strong start and seemingly good gap over second place, as his seventh race victory of the year gradually slipped away.

Meanwhile at the front, Rueda duelled Veijer before taking the lead as the pair edged away from the riders behind.

At the end of the 35-minute race, Rueda claimed victory for KTM Ajo ahead of Veijer of the Liqui Moly Husqvarna Intact GP squad.

Third position was taken by Luca Lunetta who climbed three places from his starting spot in sixth, followed by Alonso in fourth.

Kelso took fifth place for BOE Motorsports, as Taiyo Furusato claimed seventh place for Honda Team Asia.

Eighth spot was landed by Rueda’s teammate, Xabi Zurutuza.

Daniel Holgado finished in ninth place as Matteo Bertelle rounded out the top-10 finishers.

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Jaume Masia defeated Ayumu Sasaki on the final lap of the French Moto3 encounter to claim his second win of the year as he closed on the championship lead.

The original 22-tour contest was red flagged at the end of lap two after a brief rain shower coated the track and caused several riders – including title contenders Sergio Garcia, Izan Guevara and Ayumu Sasaki – to crash out, the race restarted following a 15 minute delay for a 14-lap sprint.  

With the track having since dried – and all the riders that crashed in the initial attempt able to take part in the rejuvenated encounter – Moreira repeated his start from the first race and lead the way early on ahead of Dennis Foggia and Masia.

Masia soon managed to find his way into the lead and led the way for the bulk of the encounter, the KTM Ajo racer fending off the likes of Foggia, the other Leopard Racing entry of Tatsuki Suzuki and GasGas’ Garcia throughout the race.

Having been passed for the lead by Foggia in the final couple of laps, Masia re-paid the favour by snatching back the initiative from the Italian into Turn 3 at the start of the final tour, though soon came under attack by a charging Sasaki.

The Japanese pilot pulled off a bold move on the flip-flop at Turn 10 to move take the leadership, though he left the door wide open into the subsequent slow left-hooker of Turn 11 – thus allowing Masia to fire back down the inside into a lead he would never relinquish, taking the chequered flag just 0.150s clear of a crestfallen Sasaki.

Pole-man Foggia meanwhile failed to even reach the rostrum as Izan Guevara snatched third away in the final set of bends, the Leopard man forced to settle for fourth ahead of team-mate Suzuki.

Carlos Tatay got the better of Garcia on the final lap to take sixth ahead of the series leader, who lost touch with the front group as a result of a mistake at Turn 3 on the penultimate circulation.

Ryusei Yamanaka managed a strong eighth for the second consecutive race ahead of Deniz Oncu, while Migno completed the top ten on his Snipers machine.

The returning John McPhee – who took part in his first race since Qatar in March – managed to secure solid points for 12^th just ahead of Riccardo Rossi and Moreira, who ended up only 14^th after receiving a long-lap penalty for cutting Turn 3 at around mid-distance.

Garcia’s points advantage has shrunk to just 15 over the now-tied Guevara and Foggia with a third of the season in the books, with Guevara only a further six adrift in fourth overall.

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Jorge Martin has tested positive for Covid-19 and will miss this weekend’s San Marino Grand Prix at the minimum, putting his Moto2 title hopes in doubt.

As first reported by Spanish publication AS, Martin underwent a typical Covid test several days ago and tested positive-ruling him out for the first Misano race weekend, while his participation in next week’s event rests on whether he can achieve a negative test in the days running up to the Emilia Romagna GP.

The ’18 Moto3 world champion will remain in quarantine until then, meaning he could suffer irreparable damage to his intermediate class championship charge in the interim.

The Spaniard currently sits third overall, just eight points back from leader Luca Marini and level on points with Enea Bastianini after six rounds of the 2020 series.

Martin was the man with the momentum heading to the Italian double-header, having scored a debut Moto2 victory at the Austrian GP before backing this up with a runners-up result at the same Red Bull Ring venue just a week later.

He is also due to be announced as a Pramac Ducati rider next year in the not-too-distant future, with the main question mark at this juncture regarding his team-mate-set to be whoever fails to capture the vacant factory Ducati berth between the incumbent Francesco Bagnaia or Avintia’s Johann Zarco.

Martin is the third member of the MotoGP paddock to test positive for Covid-19 so far, following a Dorna video operator as well as Red Bull Rookies pilot Matteo Bertelle.  

Martin’s positive diagnosis is worrying news for the rest of the paddock, raising questions over whether any other riders or personnel could contract the virus.

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Jorge Martin eased to a maiden Moto2 win in a shortened Austrian grand prix due to a red flag following a violent crash involving championship leader Enea Bastianini.

The Ajo racer led the early stages of the original encounter after taking the lead from pole-man Remy Gardner, and was beginning to gap second-placed Marcel Schrotter.

The race was then red flagged on lap four due to a fearsome incident involving Aspar rider Hafizh Syahrin.

Enea Bastianini lost the rear and high-sided on the exit of Turn 1, leaving his Italtrans machine stranded in the middle of the circuit.

Unsighted behind several other riders, Syahrin slammed at high-speed directly into the Kalex and was ejected over the front of his own bike.

The Malaysian was thankfully conscious following the incident and taken away to hospital, while Edgar Pons and Andi Farid Izdihar were both able to walk away under their own power after also being involved in the crash.  

The race distance was then reduced to 13 laps following the culmination of the track cleanup efforts, Martin leading the field in the restart ahead of Schrotter and VR46 man Luca Marini.

Martin once again made a strong start to lead into Turn 1, though this time ahead of Marini who had managed to slide past Schrotter into the first bend.

Marini was able to stick in the wheel-tracks for the majority of the contest, the Italian remaining around eight-tenths back before Martin really got into his stride in the closing stages.

The Spaniard began to edge away from the pursuing VR46 machine, ultimately building up a 2.2 second advantage by the time he took the chequered flag, Marini forced to settle for second-albeit now in the championship lead ahead of next weekend’s Styrian GP event.

Schrotter bagged his and Dynavolt Racing’s first podium of 2020 meanwhile, the German enjoying a quiet race as the battling Sam Lowes and Xavi Vierge behind held each other up.

The pair ran side-by-side across a good chunk of the final tour, Lowes on his Marc VDS machine eventually getting the better of Vierge and securing his fourth-fourth placed result of the season ahead of the Petronas SRT man.

Marco Bezzecchi recovered from a pair of mistakes at the start of the rescheduled event-the second of the VR46 pilots running off the track at Turn 3-to take sixth having been as low as 12^th at one point, Thomas Luthi following behind in what was a much stronger showing from the Dynavolt squad after their disastrous Brno outing last weekend.

Augusto Fernandez came home eighth on the second Marc VDS bike, while Aron Canet and Joe Roberts completed the top ten.

Gardner looked to have the pace to bag a second career Moto2 podium as he kept Schrotter at bay towards the beginning of the restart, but all was lost when the Aussie tucked the front of his SAG Racing steed at Turn 1-sliding into the gravel and out of the race.

Also retiring early on was Speed Up’s Jorge Navarro, who also lost the front but at the final turn-throwing away ninth on the opening lap of the restart.

Bastianini’s non-score means Marini holds a five-point lead over the Italtrans pilot heading to next weekend’s Styrian GP, also at the Red Bull Ring, while Martin’s success means he moves into third overall- level with Lowes and 19 in-arrears of Marini.   

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Tetsuta Nagashima tamed his tyres to secure his first ever Moto2 victory in Qatar on debut for the KTM-backed Ajo squad.

Nagashima-who started a lowly 14^th– worked his way up front early doors, managing to breach the top ten while Luca Marini and Enea Bastianini battled for the lead just ahead.

The Japanese rider was seemingly happy to cruise around looking after his tyres until he pulled the pin just past mid-distance, passing team-mate Jorge Martin as he began to struggle and closing down the leading group.

He then managed to find a way past pole-man Joe Roberts into third with only a few laps remaining, before catching and passing both Bastianini and leader Lorenzo Baldassarri into Turns 1 and 2 respectively just over a lap later, quickly getting his head down and building an advantage.

He eventually took the chequered flag 1.3 seconds clear of Baldassarri, who managed to fend off the advances of the pursuing Italtrans machine of Bastianini to take second.

Roberts managed to salvage a strong fourth-his best ever result-while Remy Gardner staged a strong comeback in the latter stages to deprive Jorge Navarro of fifth on the final lap, the Speed Up man having to make do with sixth.

Marcel Schrotter was another man to conserve his tyres well, the German fighting back from a mid-teens position early on to pip impressive rookie Aron Canet for seventh, while Xavi Vierge and Thomas Luthi completed the top ten for Petronas SRT and Intact GP respectively.

Marini looked set for victory as he managed to build a handy lead over Roberts at the mid-point of the contest, but crashed out on the final lap in a clash with Jake Dixon’s Petronas SRT machine.

The Italian had begun to struggle significantly with tyre life though, and after being re-passed by Roberts quickly dropped through the field to 14^th, coming together with the Brit at the final turn.

Dixon survived to cross the line 14^th, while Marini crashed out and failed to score points after looking so strong throughout the event.

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Raul Fernandez fired to the head of the times in the closing stages of second Moto3 practice at the Losail Circuit with a time just shy of the lap record.

FP2 saw most of the rider’s complete vital long runs ahead of qualifying day tomorrow in preparation for the race on Sunday, with the darker conditions giving a closer representation to the conditions that will grace the riders in the contest-held in twilight.

Ajo KTM man Fernandez posted his final flyer-a 2:04.577- with just over a minute remaining in the session, relegating Darryn Binder who had just lapped a little over a tenth away from the Moto3 lap record-going faster than the quickest time in testing in the process.

Binder’s time was sufficient to hang onto second as the session came to a close though, with FP1 leader Sergio Garcia again looking strong in third.

Ai Ogura held the fastest time for a while in the session, but pitted early while his rivals set a flurry of fast laps-bumping the Honda Team Asia man down to fourth with a personal best of 2:04.922.

Kajto Toba completed the top five on the second of the Ajo-prepared KTM bikes ahead of Tony Arbolino, while Andrea Migno enjoyed a more competitive session that this morning with a solid seventh quickest effort.  

Jaume Masia was Leopard’s quickest pilot in eighth, while Romano Fenati and Deniz Oncu closed out the top ten for MAX Racing and Tech 3 KTM respectively.

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